Pastoral Care and Wellbeing

Personal, Social, Health, Citizenship and Economic Education

PSHCE is an essential part of our students’ social and emotional development. It gives our students the opportunity to consider and question, in a safe and supportive environment, their role and place within the world around them. We explore six core themes:

• Being the Best I Can Be and Being a Citizen
• Celebrating Difference and Respecting Rights
• Managing Risk and Getting Help
• Healthy Relationships
• Staying Safe and Staying Healthy
• The Wider World

Through these topics, we encourage students to question, reflect on and discuss various different pertinent issues.

Our pastoral structure is centred around vertical tutor groups which are formed by students from mixed years and each group has their own assigned tutor. This system enables students to develop friendships, support networks, peer mentors and role models in different year groups throughout our school community. Research has shown that this system benefits a school environment by vastly improving learning relationships and helping the students to feel that they are members of the whole community rather than just a year group. We also encourage our students and parents to share and discuss their concerns and worries with our community of teachers.

After consultation with staff and feedback from parents over the years we decided to move away from personalities (Cook, Hillary, Raleigh and Scott) to have houses that represent the Swiss based natural environment around the school.

Rhône, Léman, Dôle and Jura have been our new house names since September 2022, and they now run through the whole school, from Pre-School to Year 13, to provide opportunities for leadership, personal challenge, teamwork, responsibility and a lot of fun.

Co-operation within houses is celebrated in many areas of school life, from the weekly award of the star cup for the house that has earned the most stars, to the wide range of inter-house competitions (art, karaoke, poetry or maths) throughout the year.

House Captains are elected annually in Year 6 for GES Primary, and in Year 13 for GES Secondary, to act as role models and leaders for their house for the whole academic year. Ms Brewin is our newly appointed House Leader and oversees all house events.

The first-of-its-kind whole school Cross-Country event in GES history happened in October 2022, and was a fantastic way to launch our new houses.

Schools exist to provide an education for students, and they deserve some control and conversation about what that education looks like. Students at GES Secondary are encouraged to talk to staff and parents about their school experiences. They are keenly listened to and their ideas and suggestions are acted upon. We want our students to develop a pride and ownership in the school, and have the confidence to communicate issues and suggest improvements.

The Secondary School Council is elected by their peers and is very much involved in all of the school’s decisions, big and small. They meet on a fortnightly basis to discuss any concerns, issues or initiatives from their year group.

This year they have been discussing new initiatives to improve the students’ daily life, such as whole school hoodies and a vending machine or tuck shop with healthy snacks.